كشاف اصطلاحات الفنون

Kashshaf Istilahat al-Funun wa al-Ulum

Kashshāf Iṣṭilāḥāt al-Funūn wa’l-ʿUlūm (كشاف اصطلاحات الفنون والعلوم) by al-Tahānawī is a major encyclopaedic dictionary of the technical terminology of the Islamic sciences. It gathers and explains the specialised terms employed by scholars across a remarkably wide range of disciplines, including Qurʾānic sciences, Hadith, Fiqh and Uṣūl al-Fiqh, theology, philosophy, logic, Sufism, Arabic grammar and rhetoric, mathematics, astronomy, medicine and other sciences.

Al-Tahānawī does considerably more than provide brief definitions: he frequently traces the different meanings of a term according to the discipline in which it is used, records disagreements over its definition, distinguishes it from related concepts, and quotes or summarises explanations from authoritative works. The result is an invaluable reference for understanding the precise technical vocabulary of the classical Islamic scholarly tradition, particularly terms whose specialised meanings differ from their ordinary linguistic usage.